Your Tax Dollars at Work in Gaza

The confusing and complex campaign for aid to a pro-terror Palestinian Authority.

Last week, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported that American
officials are again pressing Congress to open up the U.S. aid pipeline
to the Palestinian Authority. And then on March 19, as Reuters reported
on March 19, Washington agreed to transfer $150 million in budgetary
support to the PA to help Mahmoud Abbas's government, out of $550
million pledged at a donors' conference last year.

If the plea sounds familiar, it ought to. Since the 1993 Oslo Accords,
Americans have been subsidizing the activities of the P.A. to the tune
of hundreds of millions of dollars per year.

Today, as in the past, the arguments in favor of this policy are
urgent. We are told by both administration officials who are friends of
Israel and by some Israelis that unless we help fund the training and
the payment of Palestinian security forces, the P.A. will have no way
to cope with terrorists who want to sink any chance of a two-state
solution which would enable Israel to live side-by-side with a peaceful
Palestinian partner.

The Only Option?

With Hamas in control of Gaza, the P.A., under the current leadership
of Mahmoud Abbas, is, we are informed, the only address for creating a
moderate force that will work for peace. Given the alternative of the
Iranian-backed Hamas or the equally unpalatable choices of either
Israel reoccupying the territories or an international peacekeeping
force doing so, reinforcing the P.A. seems to make sense. But does it
really?

Doubts about the wisdom of the policy have led Rep. Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.)
and Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Florida.) — respectively, the chair and the
ranking minority member of the House Foreign Operations Subcommittee —
to place a hold on a request of another $150 million in direct
assistance to the P.A. It now seems to have gotten around that and has
even asked the committee to okay an additional $25 million in indirect
funding for the military training program.

Support by the P.A. media for attacks against Israelis, such as the slaughter of eight students at a Jerusalem yeshiva, is also reason to doubt the P.A.'s sincerity.

Both Lowey and Ros-Lehtinen rightly worry about the commitment of Abbas
and his Fatah Party to peace. They cite recent statements by Abbas in
which he would not rule out a return to "armed resistance" against
Israel. The support by the P.A. media for attacks against Israelis,
such as the slaughter of eight students at a Jerusalem yeshiva this
month, as well as the ongoing blitz of southern Israel by Hamas
missiles, is also reason to doubt the P.A.'s sincerity.

The P.A. also continues to honor the memory of slain terrorists as
"martyrs" and, as The Jerusalem Post reported this week, plans to
celebrate Israel's 60th birthday by having Arab refugees to rush
Israel's borders to promote a "right of return," which is synonymous
with the destruction of the Jewish State.

Supporters of aid respond that these statements do not reflect Abbas'
real goals. Yet, they ignore the fact that what the P.A. has done for
the past 15 years is to legitimize a Palestinian culture in which
political plaudits are won only by killing Jews. Indeed, via its
control of broadcast outlets, newspapers and the schools, the P.A. has
solidified a mindset of hate.

Just as bad is the history of attempts to create a P.A. security force.
The Oslo agreements called for the creation of a Palestinian police
force that would combat terrorists. But Arafat had other ideas.

While most of the billions that came his way via aid from the European
Union and the United States went into the pockets or Swiss bank
accounts of Fatah officials, some of it was used to create a byzantine
web of Palestinian "security" agencies whose purposes were anything but
peaceful. When push came to shove as Arafat blew up the peace after the
Camp David summit in 2000, it was these P.A. forces (including some
who'd been trained by the Philadelphia Police Department) who committed
terrorist acts against Israelis.

Adding to that sorry tale was the fiasco in Gaza in 2006 when Fatah
thugs, aided and equipped by foreign sources at the specific
instigation of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, sought to maintain
Abbas' control of the area, even after the Hamas election victory.

As detailed in an investigative report published in the April issue of
Vanity Fair magazine, the concerns voiced by some Israelis and
skeptical members of Congress over that particular venture in
bolstering Abbas were prophetic.

While Fatah goons tortured and kidnapped some of their rivals, neither
they nor their leader Abbas had the stomach to face down Hamas, despite
promises to do so. In the end, Abbas' men wouldn't fight, and the more
popular Hamas seized control of Gaza. As David Rose writes in Vanity
Fair, "The exact thing both Israel and the U.S. Congress warned against
came to pass when Hamas captured most of Fatah's arms and ammunition —
including the Egyptian guns supplied under the covert U.S.-Arab aid
program."

For 15 years, critics of such expenditures have been labeled as
"anti-peace," but that tag just served as an excuse for whitewashes of
misbehavior by first Arafat and now Abbas.

An anonymous U.S. official told JTA that the 1,100 P.A. gunmen
currently in Jordan, at American expense and with Israeli permission,
are being schooled in such things as "training in riot control, human
rights, and effective arrests and defensive shooting." But so were
their predecessors. Left unanswered in this account is why reasonable
people should think this group will behave any differently.

Painted Into a Corner

The alternatives to Abbas are frightful. He is both weak and probably
not much less ill-intentioned than Hamas, but he and his loyalists are
seen as a counterforce to Iran's allies.

Should American supporters of Israel therefore feel obligated to
support the continued flow of funds to P.A. sources?

Propping up Fatah has not undermined Hamas, nor promoted peace.

The problem is, the peace processors have painted themselves into a
corner. Having coronated first Arafat and now Abbas, they are forced to
ignore or suppress the truth about them in order to maintain American
support for a two-state solution.

At the same time, Israel's government takes the position that it needs
a Palestinian partner who at least pays lip service to peace, as Abbas
does. And no one here wants to do anything that would help create a
greater "Hamasistan."

Yet experience shows that the realpolitik strategy of propping up Fatah
has not undermined Hamas, nor promoted peace. Perhaps the beginning of
wisdom is the recognition that it's time to stop reinforcing failure.

America's attempts to create a Palestinian peace partner have failed.
No amount of money will buy us a moderate state that will accept peace
with Israel if the Palestinians don't want one. If the president and
the secretary of state aren't honest enough to admit this, then perhaps
it's appropriate to ask Congress to turn off the spigot that sends more
of our tax dollars down a Palestinian drain.

The opinions expressed in the comment section are the personal views of the commenters. Comments are moderated, so please keep it civil.

Visitor Comments: 6

(6)
Reg Saretsky,
March 29, 2008 12:10 AM

Ben K, the Rally has been delayed...

The banners that cry 'Israel's actions are worse than the Holocaust "have to be changed over to "Israel's actions are worse than the Holocaust that we deny has ever occurred...."which requires extra material, silk screening,& stitching over both the physical & the logical gaps...

(5)
Ben K,
March 25, 2008 3:46 PM

SO When Is The Rally?

Perhaps especially during Presidential election season, it is best to have a RALLY demanding no more tax payer money to an utterly inept Palestinian Authority that refers to Israeli battles against Islamic terrorists as 'worse than the Holocaust' and that has its media call a terrorist that guns down religous school students in their religous seminary as 'heroic' and that never hints at ANY COMPROMISE on all Palestinian hard line positions!

(4)
IludiumPhosdex,
March 24, 2008 4:26 PM

What irony!

White supremacists and racists who would not want to be caught dead supporting Israel and Zionism have this rather illogical delusion that "the enemy of my enemy is a friend of mine" to excuse support for the Palestinian cause.

This in spite of their otherwise attacking Palestinian Arabs (Muslims, for the most part) as being "inferior peoples" (howbeit in crass and vulgar terms I would rather not repeat here), not to mention a general leeriness about being seen as supporting International Terrorism by support of the Palestinian cause.

Can you spot the doublethink?

(3)
Hinda,
March 24, 2008 8:44 AM

Impeach Everyone and Start Fresh

Since I can remember the US has played a "big brother" kind of role with Israel. Except for a few presidents who had a clear agenda that unfortunately was hinted at when they were serving the country but clearly came in full view after they left office the leaders of the US always was pro-Israel (up to a point).

But now we have a leader as well as members of Congress who would rather give in to the terrorists then to support a true ally, perhaps in reality the only true ally ever.

This is not only a sign of being a traitor to an ally but also appeasing the well known terrorists who have been proven to be linked to major terrorist agencies around the world is a true sign of weakness.

Abu Mamzen is not in reality a man of peace he's still like his best friend Arafat in a suit. He speaks one thing in English and clearly something else in Arabic. The Oslo Accords, the many failed agreements always had proven that Israel does want to coexist but the other-side is still doing the dance of Arafat - that if one speaks of a lie long enough it too will become believable.

Why do we, American Jews stand silent and allow this to happen? What are we afraid of? Even our children's history books are using the propaganda that Arafat use to state. That Israel IS an Apartheid state -- that's from a 7th grade history book that our children are learning from.

We need to stand up and say no more. Because the true "Palestinians" do not exist - the people in these regions are Hamassvillians/Arafaters because that is clearly what they follow. And they would rather kill their own children (which they have done so already since birth - mentally) to make them shaheeds (matyrs) then even consider any alternative. Mein Kampf is taught in their schools, Mickey Mouse, Elmo (sesame street) and other children entities are teaching their young to kill a Jew first is what Allah commands, then you can go after a Christian. Reminds me of the Hitler Youth and if one does enough research - the link between Arafat's time in Nazi Europe and the modern PLO/PA/Hamass is very clear.

(2)
Liora,
March 24, 2008 7:42 AM

Not all Americans agree

Agree that land for peace will never work nor will appeasement and we should not be funding the PA in any way. But if we went into Iraq for the oil, why isn't the oil paying for the war? It's costing a lot of money to be in Iraq not to mention lives of the people trying to help the country get strong enough to withstand the onslaught of terrorists that would see it sink back into the mire of domination. The same domination that supports Hamas, Hezbollah, and teaches generation after generation that same dogma.

My husband served 12 years for Israel in the Gaza strip and there will never be peace there, ever. The US should not be sending money there as an ally of Israel.

The people of Gaza elected Hamas, that said volumes. They don't want freedom and a state to live in peace with Israel, they want to push the Jews into the Dead Sea and those that fund Hamas are helping them do it.

(1)
Well wisher,
March 23, 2008 4:29 PM

American Tax Dollars in Gaza

What is going on with America who professes to be a friend to Israel on the one hand but does deals with the Palestinians to the tune of millions of American tax dollars, which never appear to be passed on to the people themselves. It seems to me the American government is playing a double-handed game here. This land belongs to Israel - who won this land fair and square in a number of wars. No country has ever been asked to give back land won in a war. I would like to see America give back anything they won in a war. George Bush is putting pressure on Israel to get some sort of a solution in the Middle East to offset a less than honourable presidential term in office. Just like his father before him, he only went into Iraq for the oil. If America is such a friend to Israel, why are they cow-towing to Hamas - the, so-called, Palestinians were Cretans originally. Remember,it was the Palestinian people who themselves voted into government these terrorists. There is a saying 'Give them an inch and they'll take your backyard. Appeasment never ever works.

I've been striving to get more into spirituality. But it seems that every time I make some progress, I find myself slipping right back to where I started. I'm getting discouraged and feel like a failure. Can you help?

The Aish Rabbi Replies:

Spiritual slumps are a natural part of spiritual growth. There is a cycle that people go through when at times they feel closer to God and at times more distant. In the words of the Kabbalists, it is "two steps forward and one step back." So although you feel you are slipping, know that this is a natural process. The main thing is to look at your overall progress (over months or years) and be able to see how far you've come!

This is actually God's ingenious way of motivating us further. The sages compare this to teaching a baby how to walk. When the parent is holding on, the baby shrieks with delight and is under the illusion that he knows how to walk. Yet suddenly, when the parent lets go, the child panics, wobbles and may even fall.

At such times when we feel spiritually "down," that is often because God is letting go, giving us the great gift of independence. In some ways, these are the times when we can actually grow the most. For if we can move ourselves just a little bit forward, we truly acquire a level of sanctity that is ours forever.

Here is a practical tool to help pull you out of the doldrums. The Sefer HaChinuch speaks about a great principle in spiritual growth: "The external awakens the internal." This means that although we may not experience immediate feelings of closeness to God, eventually, by continuing to conduct ourselves in such a manner, this physical behavior will have an impact on our spiritual selves and will help us succeed. (A similar idea is discussed by psychologists who say: "Smile and you will feel happy.")

That is the power of Torah commandments. Even if we may not feel like giving charity or praying at this particular moment, by having a "mitzvah" obligation to do so, we are in a framework to become inspired. At that point we can infuse that act of charity or prayer with all the meaning and lift it can provide. But if we'd wait until being inspired, we might be waiting a very long time.

May the Almighty bless you with the clarity to see your progress, and may you do so with joy.

In 1940, a boatload 1,600 Jewish immigrants fleeing Hitler's ovens was denied entry into the port of Haifa; the British deported them to the island of Mauritius. At the time, the British had acceded to Arab demands and restricted Jewish immigration into Palestine. The urgent plight of European Jewry generated an "illegal" immigration movement, but the British were vigilant in denying entry. Some ships, such as the Struma, sunk and their hundreds of passengers killed.

If you seize too much, you are left with nothing. If you take less, you may retain it (Rosh Hashanah 4b).

Sometimes our appetites are insatiable; more accurately, we act as though they were insatiable. The Midrash states that a person may never be satisfied. "If he has one hundred, he wants two hundred. If he gets two hundred, he wants four hundred" (Koheles Rabbah 1:34). How often have we seen people whose insatiable desire for material wealth resulted in their losing everything, much like the gambler whose constant urge to win results in total loss.

People's bodies are finite, and their actual needs are limited. The endless pursuit for more wealth than they can use is nothing more than an elusive belief that they can live forever (Psalms 49:10).

The one part of us which is indeed infinite is our neshamah (soul), which, being of Divine origin, can crave and achieve infinity and eternity, and such craving is characteristic of spiritual growth.

How strange that we tend to give the body much more than it can possibly handle, and the neshamah so much less than it needs!